Flooding won't wash out Scholastic Inc.

Thursday

Mar 27, 2008 at 12:01 AMMar 27, 2008 at 9:39 AM

Heavy rains flooded the Scholastic Inc. call center building last week, forcing the company to set up a temporary center at Crowder College. However, there are no intentions to move the call center to a new permanent site, either in town or out, said Scholastic public relations coordinator Kyle Good.

Wes Franklin

Heavy rains flooded the Scholastic Inc. call center building on Harmony Street last week, forcing the company to set up a temporary center at Crowder College.

There are no plans, however, to move the call center to a new permanent site, either in town or out, Scholastic public relations coordinator Kyle Good said Wednesday from her New York City office.

“There’s a lot of ‘word’ around maybe, but it doesn’t necessarily mean anything,” Good said. "We’re working on getting the repairs done (on the Harmony Street building) and getting everybody back in there as soon as we can.”

According to information provided by Scholastic, water covered more than 80 percent of the carpeted work area.

Specifically asked about moving the call center to a new location given the flooding problems at the current building, Good stated that “there is no plan to do that right now.”

“We have to figure out how to make the place watertight, and obviously that means we have to work with the landlord there,” she said. “But we have every intention to keep people working.”

Good said she didn’t know when the water-logged Harmony Street building would be ready, but said she hoped to receive an assessment very soon.

Scholastic has transferred about 150 computer work stations to Crowder’s Elsie Plaster Center for employees to take incoming calls, and the company is working with Empire District Electric to set up the fiber-optic connections.

“We couldn’t have done this without Crowder and Empire,” said Steve Marble, director of customer service for Scholastic. “The willingness of both Crowder and Empire management and staff to help us, especially over a [Easter] holiday weekend, is a testament to their extraordinary commitment to this community."

So far, only about 30 of the work stations are up and running, which means 60 Scholastic employees have returned to work. However, Good said the remainder of the stations should be connected by Monday morning.